2025
Gomuk, India

Land Art Performance

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"May our souls be bound in the bundle of life"...
 

“Mother of Souls” is a large mala made of 108 beads (plus one “guru bead”) each crafted from Himalayan pine needles and traditional temple-blessed thread. Inside each bead, I placed a handwritten note: on one side, a single negative human trait; on the other, the words “pure love”.

The final guru bead bears the word “fear,” representing the culmination of all those heavier energies.

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The number 108 is sacred in many spiritual traditions, known to correspond with the body’s energy channels—nadis—which converge in the heart. For me, each bead represents a portal of transformation: a point of passage from density to clarity, from karma to love. A journey of returning to the purity of the heart.

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During its creation in Gangotri, India, I gently blessed each bead with the Hebrew mantra from Psalm 51:
“Lev tahor bara li Elohim...” (“Create in me a pure heart, O God...”) I then carried the mala high into the Himalayas, trekking to Gomukh at 4,100 m—the sacred birthplace of the Ganges.

There, under the full‑moon light, I held a simple ceremony, offering the mala to the river.

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This work marks the closing of a karmic journey across India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka—a personal transformation that I offer outwardly, releasing both my own karma and the collective energies of our time. As the river carries the mala, it carries all those intentions of purification, healing, and release.

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photography: John Rundle